Fleeting
by ncfan
Summary: Celegorm searches for Aredhel, and wonders.
1. A Moment Lost

I own nothing.

* * *

"_Don't you think you should be answering those letters?" Caranthir asked sharply, the third time a messenger came from Himlad, from Celebrimbor, and Curufin took his son's letter and put it away without opening it._

_Celegorm snorted and smirked as Curufin shook his head and replied, "No, no I do not. I left Telpe at Himlad because he needs the experience of being in charge by himself for a while."_

_At this, all Celegorm could do was laugh. Huan, who had been asleep with his head resting across Celegorm's knees, woke and looked at him in what could only be described as disappointment. Celegorm rubbed his ears comfortingly. "You know Curvo. If you leave it to him to teach a child how to swim, he'll toss that child into the middle of a river and have them swim to shore unaided."_

_Curufin shot him a distinctly unappreciative look. "I don't think these two situations are comparable," he said stiffly. "Telperinquar knows what to do; he just needs to be able to _do it._ He needs hands-on experience, and he's not going to get it with me breathing down his neck."_

_Celegorm grinned, but for Huan's sake didn't laugh. "You'd rather be breathing down his neck." Curufin glared at him. "No, no, I can tell. I don't think you've really relaxed for a full day since we left Himlad in Telperinquar's hands."_

_He was cornered, and knew it. Curufin didn't answer._

_Caranthir made a harsh noise in the back of his throat. "Fine, don't answer your boy's letters. Don't even read them. Don't come to me for help if you return to Himlad and find it a smoking ruin."_

"_Oh, brother. It can not possibly be anything as serious as that."_

-0-0-0-

"Father? Father!"

Contrary to Caranthir's prediction, Himlad was not a smoking ruin when Celegorm and Curufin returned to it. It was quite intact, just as they'd left it—the stones of the fortress seemed a little more weather-worn than they had when last Celegorm had laid eyes on them, but that was to be expected, and really wasn't anything to be concerned about.

Celebrimbor was right where they'd left him too, and no one could look more relieved to see his father and uncle returning to their home than Curufin's boy, as he came running up to them. Entirely too relieved, Celegorm noted with a frown. Celebrimbor's face was pale, his eyes shining over-bright, and it wasn't the gray sky alone that made him look that way. His brow was furrowed as though he had been spending many a sleepless night in worry. Himlad was still intact. Was there some other sort of crisis afoot?

Curufin seemed to sense none of his son's anxiety as he dismounted and handed his horse's reins off to a stable boy. "Well I'm glad to see you as well, Telperinquar." He raised an eyebrow at his son's rather wild-eyed expression. "There doesn't seem to be anything on fire, son." He peered over Celebrimbor's head for emphasis. "I don't see what could have you in such a state."

Normally, saying something like that would have been enough to give Celebrimbor back some of his equanimity. The assurance that his father wasn't angry and would probably help him with whatever problem had arisen usually gave him confidence. And Celegorm wasn't used to seeing him look quite so worried to start with. But today, Celebrimbor could not be reassured. He stared back and forth between each of them, pale and incredulous, shaking his head in disbelief.

Celegorm's frown deepened as he handed off his own horse. There was something shadowed behind Celebrimbor's eyes, something that gave him a strong sense of foreboding. Huan padded over to Celebrimbor and pressed against his side soothingly, but he didn't even seem to notice. "What's wrong, Telpe?"

At this, Celebrimbor's expression went from wild-eyed to downright panicked. "Did neither of you read _any_ of my letters?" he asked shakily. "I've had riders scouring all of Himlad; I thought the reason you'd stayed in Thargelion for so many more months than you said you would was because you were searching there as well."

There was laughter in Curufin's voice as he questioned, "Searching for what?", but that laughter was starting to sound a little uncertain.

The look that stole over Celebrimbor's face in response was almost pitying—no small feat, considering that he still looked panicked as well. "You won't be laughing when I tell you. It's Irissë. She went missing here last winter."

"Irissë?!"

Had he shouted? They were both looking at him as though he had. Still at Celebrimbor's side, Huan flattened his ears against his head and looked at him anxiously. To Celegorm though, all had gone silent. The wind dropped out of hearing, the guardsmen's conversations vanished into nothingness. Even the beating of his heart was muffled. "She was here?" he asked, all the while telling himself that he didn't sound hoarse. "And… now, she's missing?"

Pitying still, but now devoid of panic, Celebrimbor nodded wordlessly. Curufin took over the conversation, grim and tense, putting a hand on his son's shoulder and motioning him inside. "Let's go inside. Tell me everything."

Celebrimbor told them his tale. Last summer, Aredhel had appeared outside of Himlad, leading a weary horse to safety and staggering a bit herself. She who had followed her brother to his hidden city and dwelled there with him for more than two hundred years had finally left, and had made for her cousins' lands. After being denied entry into Doriath, she and her escort had been forced to cross through Nan Dungortheb, and there had encountered Ungoliant's spawn. Aredhel had been separated from her escort, had long searched for them, but eventually the peril she faced forced her to leave the region and seek safety. She had been wounded—not badly, Celebrimbor assured them; she'd either caught none or negligible amounts of venom, and the main problem was the amount of blood she'd lost through the wound—and not being a healer, needed someone to see to her wound.

They'd received her courteously, Celebrimbor told them. The guardsmen on duty had recognized her; probably more miraculous was the fact that Celebrimbor had recognized her, considering how young he had been when last they met. Her wound had been seen to and she recovered quickly, back to her full strength within a week. There was no need to worry about her being somewhere in the wild, wounded and weak.

Aredhel had never planned on staying in Himlad for good; she'd made that clear from the beginning. She had, in fact, planned on moving on once Celegorm and Curufin returned from Thargelion, to Nargothrond, in fact. At this, Celebrimbor glared reproachfully at his father, saying that she had wanted to speak with them and he had sent letters conveying her desire, but all of his letters had, of course, gone unanswered. Curufin had the grace to look abashed.

"Did Irissë say what she wanted to speak with us about?" This was the first (only) time Celegorm interrupted his nephew's tale, and again he told himself that he did not sound hoarse. He told himself that he could hear his heart beating.

"No, Uncle. She didn't." Celebrimbor shifted his weight uncomfortably. "I did not think it meet to ask."

"You said earlier that Irissë went missing during the winter," Curufin interjected sharply. "What part of winter was it exactly, Telperinquar?"

It was easy to see what he was getting at. The snow had come late this past winter, but once it did, it was unusually heavy and deep for this part of Beleriand. Aredhel was hardy and resourceful. She knew how to survive in the wild, and by the winter she would have had months to recover from the wound she'd been dealt in Nan Dungortheb. All the same, a wise person wouldn't have put good money on her being able to survive the entire winter out in the wilderness, without aid or shelter.

Celebrimbor tilted his head to one side, brow furrowed as he remembered. "It was in the waning of the year; we'd yet to have any snow. Irissë…" He shrugged helplessly. "She went out riding one day, said she'd be back in a few hours. Her _horse _returned, certainly, and a right state the poor beast was in. But she never did. I… Like I said, Father, I've had riders searching for her here, but beyond that…" He faltered, shook his head. "…I really don't know what to do."

In the face of his son's nearly tearful pallor, Curufin could not remain stony, and he was rather pale himself, though he didn't show his worry otherwise. He put a comforting hand on Celebrimbor's shoulder. "Alright. I'll send messengers to Himring and Estolad and the Gap—if she was in Thargelion, we probably would have come across her there, but I'll let Carnistir know as well. To Hithlum, Dorthonion, Minas Tirith and Nargothrond as well, since Irissë had decided to move on to Nargothrond anyways." His gaze turned to Celegorm, and for the first time, Curufin's face was creased with hesitation. "Tyelkormo?"

"What? Oh… Yes. Yes, do it."

Curufin's pale eyes searched his face. Really starting to look worried, now. "I wouldn't put it past her to have made for Nargothrond without giving word," he said, even, measured, too much so.

Celegorm said nothing. They both knew better than that.

Celegorm felt… He felt… He would admit it. He felt breathless. He felt sick. Aredhel had been here. She had actually been here. When was the last time he'd seen her? In Hithlum. But she had been here. Why had she come here? And then, she'd gone missing, nearly six months ago. Six months. That seemed like such a short time. But then, the six months Aredhel would have spent waiting for them must have seemed like an eternity to her.

So where was she now?

* * *

Telpe, Telperinquar—Celebrimbor  
Curvo—Curufin  
Irissë—Aredhel  
Carnistir—Caranthir  
Tyelkormo—Celegorm


	2. In the Tall Grass

"_Telperinquar, I want you to go to Nargothrond, and deliver Findaráto's letter in person."_

_Curufin had a decidedly distracted look on his face as he concluded his letter to Finrod—last in a long pile, of letters to Maedhros, to Maglor and Ilmanis, to Caranthir, to Amrod and Amras, to Angrod and Aegnor, Fingolfin, Lalwen and Fingon, Orodreth and Meresír, and finally Finrod. Out of Curufin and Celegorm, the former had the better handwriting, and Celegorm would admit that he wasn't really in the state to write a coherent letter at the moment, so it had fallen to Curufin to write them._

_Celebrimbor paused in the middle of fastening his cloak. "Any reason why?"_

"_When I think about it, it seems unlikely that Irissë simply chose to ride on to Nargothrond. I wouldn't," Curufin asserted with a smirk, "put it past her to just try and ride on to Nargothrond without saying anything, though to be honest, she probably would not have ridden off without the proper supplies, if that was her intent. But once she got there, even if she had told Findaráto not to send any messages back to Himlad, for whatever reason, I don't think he would agree." Curufin grimaced. "He would think it _unkind_. There is always the off-chance that she managed to prevail upon him, though. If you go in person, you'll be able to see for yourself if she is there."_

_Celebrimbor really had been a small child when last he had met Aredhel. At the suggestion that she would really try to ride for Nargothrond, his eyebrows shot up towards his hairline. "You think she really would try to ride all the way to Nargothrond by herself, Father?"_

"_She rode further than that by herself when we lived still in Aman."_

_No one said to him that in Aman, there had been safety. No one said to him that in Aman, no one had to worry about being killed in the wilderness by Orcs or fell creatures of Morgoth._

_Celegorm made no effort to involve himself in the conversation. He was gathering what he would need—bow, arrows, hunting knife and sword. Cloak, gloves. He could find food in the wild. Huan loped over to his side, and Celegorm stroked his head absently._

_He had everything he would need to live out in the wild, for as long as he needed._

-0-0-0-

When they were little, Celegorm and Aredhel would play tag in the tall grass of the wilds outside of Tirion. It was one of their favorite games to play together, before they discovered hunting and riding and archery. Under Laurelin's light they chased after one another in the tall grass, shrieking with laughter, blissfully unaware of tension, of want, of suffering of any stripe.

Aredhel was always highly visible. Celegorm was at least allowed to dress in greens and browns and grays that would let him blend in better. She, on the other hand, was first made as a very small child to always wear the rich blue of her father's house, and then, of her own accord, began to wear bright white dresses and tunics. Her dark black hair was highly visible as well. Under normal circumstances, Aredhel might have lost sight of Celegorm in the grass, but he never lost sight of her, even when they ventured into grass that grew up high over their heads.

She learned some tricks; she caught on quickly. Aredhel clung still to her white dresses and tunics—it wasn't that she _always _wore white, but she wore it so often that Celegorm had no clear memories of her wearing any other color of her own accord—for reasons that Celegorm did not understand, but she began to favor cloaks of varying shades of green. Her trousers would be gray or brown. And she could run _very _fast when she put her mind to it. Nevertheless, Celegorm usually had no trouble spotting her. Usually.

There were times, though. He would look all around him, peer through the long, swaying green grass, and see no sign of Aredhel, no matter where he looked. It was as though she had been swallowed up by the earth. Celegorm would run about in the grass searching for her, pushing aside the stalks and navigating his way around the rocks and bushes that arose out of the great green sea, to see nothing. His heart would begin to pound, blood racing in his chest, breath hitching with panic.

At the last moment, just before he was going to shout her name, shout _"Irissë? Where are you?!" _she would appear. Aredhel would jump out from behind him, plant her hands on his shoulders and send him tumbling down to earth with her. Her face and neck were flushed scarlet. The air was filled with the sound of her laughter, ringing in his ears. Celegorm would look up at the sky, and so would she. Beyond Laurelin's golden light, bathing all the world in its glow, they could see the stars wheeling in the sky. Even with that sight filling his vision, her laughter still rang in his ears

That seemed like such a long time ago. It no longer seemed real.

He asked the birds, and they had no idea where she was. He asked the wind, and the wind could not say. It was as though the earth had swallowed her up, and left no trace behind, but a wild-eyed horse left to stray back whence it came, without its rider.

Celegorm was alone here, with Huan. It would have been no trouble to mount a horse and ride across the Himlad. A strong horse, bred in Valinor or descended from that stock, could have ridden all the way across this land within half a day, and Huan could keep pace with such a horse easily, even outrun it. But he had not wanted to ride. He did not want to be able to cut across the Himlad within a few hours, even if it meant he would be able to cover more ground, more quickly. He felt as though, if he did that, he would miss her, just as he had missed her when she had arrived here, weary from her travels, nearly a year ago.

Himlad was an empty land, and in that, it reminded Celegorm of the lands he had long ago left behind. It was a land of rolling hills, carpeted with seas of swaying grass, where islands of rocks and heather and dense clumps of trees rose over the waves. Roaming through Himlad with Huan at his side was almost like roaming through the wilds of Aman, going for days at a time without laying eyes on anyone. But the sky was murky gray, and not golden or silver, and Celegorm felt none of the joy, nor even the contentment he had felt when he wandered the wilds of Aman.

Where could she have gone, to have vanished so completely?

He and Huan had been searching in the wild for nearly two weeks now. They had taken refuge with one of the outposts only when a storm came thundering up out of the east. Himlad did not have the warmth of lands further south and west, but it was early summer, and Celegorm had never thought much of the cold. He could sleep beneath the stars without thinking about or even really noticing the biting wind—he was not one of the survivors of the Helcaraxë, nearly all of whom had developed a noticeable deep aversion to the cold.

_But Irissë is one of the survivors of the crossing. Would she not seek shelter somewhere? Could she even be living among the Laiquendi in Ossiriand? The Laiquendi are a skittish lot, but Irissë wouldn't be the first Noldo to be accepted into their ranks. _Celegorm smirked humorlessly. _I wonder how she would react to having to wear nothing but green._

The Laiquendi might well give her shelter, allow her to live among them as one of their own. Black hair was not as common among the Teleri as it was the Noldor, but it was not unheard-of, and Celegorm understood that there had been a fair amount of mixing between the two camps here in Endóre, in the days during and before the March away from Cuiviénen. Between that and the fact that there was a certain number of Exiles who had gone to live with the Laiquendi, and no one would think it strange to see a nís in Laiquendë green, with Noldorin features and the accent of the Exiles. Aredhel could have gone to live with the Laiquendi, either under a false name or her own, and asked them that they not say anything of her presence among them. The Laiquendi were skittish, they were a very private people. They would not advertise Aredhel's presence among them, if she asked them not to.

Would she ask them to do that?

At one time, Celegorm would have been able to confidently answer 'No.' In Aman, Aredhel would never have done something like that. She would not have run away to live in some remote community, without sending word to any of her family, without sending word to _him_. She wandered about at will, certainly, wandered all over the continent, and there were times when she forgot to notify her parents of her leaving, but she always returned to Tirion eventually. Sometimes Ingwë had to _send_ her back, but she always came back eventually.

Celegorm had to remind himself of this at least once a year, and he did so again now: this wasn't Aman. This wasn't the life he had had in Aman, and Aredhel's wasn't the life she had had, either. They could not move with the same freedom in Beleriand; there was too much danger here to do so. And Aredhel had dwelled in her brother's hidden city for more than two hundred years. Celegorm had no idea where Turgon had settled; no one did. Somehow, Celegorm doubted that wherever Turgon had settled with his people after leaving Nevrast had nearly as much open land to roam about in as Aredhel needed to be content. Over time, the entire continent of Aman had grown too small to content her—how could her brother's lands suffice? Celegorm remembered Aredhel in her frustration, remembered how she had longed to wander and roam freely in lands she had never laid eyes upon. Wherever she had gone with Turgon, likely she could not roam at all.

Free of that place, there was little Aredhel would not do to keep her freedom. Celegorm did not think her heartless enough to simply vanish into the wilderness and let all who loved her think her dead, but then, it had been a long time since he had known his cousin, and it had been a long time since Aredhel had been able to call herself 'free.' Celegorm's hand strayed unconsciously to the hilt of his sword as he stared out over the wilderness. He knew… He knew all too well the things desperation could drive a person to do.

But why, _why _had she come here? And if she truly had fled into the anonymity of life in Ossiriand, Celegorm wondered if Aredhel would let him think her truly lost, after all. Maybe that was only just.

"I don't understand it," he muttered, sitting down in the grass. Huan flopped down beside him, quickly finding his favorite resting place for his massive, shaggy gray head—Celegorm's knees. "All the places for Irissë to come after leaving Turukáno's lands, everywhere she could have gone in Beleriand, and she came here. Even if it wasn't to stay, you would think…" Thunder rumbled in the distant sky, and his eyes searched the gray horizon, trying to discern any hint of a white speck on the hills. "After everything that happened," Celegorm said quietly, "I would not have expected it."

They had been the closest of friends, Celegorm and Aredhel. Once. In Aman, there had been nothing between them, no pain, no suffering, no loss, so there was nothing to mar their friendship. Aredhel had always been a part of Celegorm's life; he could scarcely remember any time without her.

For a year or two, when they were half-grown adolescents and Celegorm was still persuaded to believe that this sort of thing was a rite of passage, he convinced himself that he was in love with her. It seemed only natural; they were always together, he and Aredhel, always wanting to be together, to do things together. Was that not a natural course towards marriage? It did not matter to Celegorm that the customs of all the Calaquendi vehemently forbade marriage between first cousins (even if one got the impression that the Falmari were a little more lax about it than others); he told himself that they had only their grandfather Finwë in common, and that their differing grandmothers deepened the distance in relation between them. It also mattered not that Aredhel was wholly unaware of the nature of his affections towards her. She would see it in time.

Celegorm did everything he could to impress her. Aredhel, being the person that she was in those days, took these attempts as friendly challenges. Trying to impress her with his archery skills inevitably led to competitions that she often won. The same went for horseback riding, and swimming, and tree-climbing. Being smaller than him, Aredhel had an advantage in dense tree branches and on horses; Celegorm's greater size presented him with an advantage in rivers.

Maglor and Ilmanis were newly wed in those days. They were the epitome of what was considered the "traditional" Calaquendi couple. They had met as children, fallen in love early, and had barely been grown when they wed. It was watching his brother and sister-in-law interact that eventually led Celegorm to realize that he wasn't really in love with Aredhel. He _loved _her, certainly, but he was not _in love_ with her. What he felt for Aredhel was not the same sort of love as Maglor felt for his wife. If Fingolfin considered Fëanor a full brother in heart, though they were half-brothers in flesh, Celegorm considered Aredhel a sister in heart, though they were cousins in flesh, and half-cousins at that.

But that had been in Aman, before the Unrest, the Darkening, the Flight, the Kinslaying. Before Losgar, and the burning of the Swan-ships, and the crossing of the Grinding Ice.

As tensions rose between Fëanor and Fingolfin, as tensions rose between all the Noldor and some sort of breaking point seemed increasingly imminent, Celegorm did not see Aredhel nearly as often as he used to. They still visited from time to time, still roamed together from time to time, but never alone, as they had before, usually with Curufin, or Finrod, or some of their other kin.

She only came to Formenos once during the time of his father's banishment. Fëanor managed to scare her away. Maglor had visited Tirion on a somewhat-regular basis during the banishment to Formenos, but Celegorm never did. He felt that he had to stand by his father, no matter it cost him to do so, and so he never left Formenos. Sometimes, he wished he had.

Once the Trees were despoiled and slain, once Finwë was horribly killed and darkness had fallen over Aman, Celegorm and Aredhel had no chance to speak with one another. In the tumult, the terror of the Darkening and the chaos of the Revolt and the Oath, there was no chance for Celegorm to speak to her.

He had also had no chance to speak to her after the Kinslaying at Alqualondë. Fëanor was fell and fey, and Celegorm feared the sort of reaction his father would have if he tried to speak to one of Fingolfin's children. Celegorm saw the blood on Aredhel's sword. He saw the blood on her sleeves, and her haunted, ashen face, and knowing why she had killed on the quays of Alqualondë, Celegorm was too ashamed to wish to speak with her.

Then, came the moment when their friendship died. Any friendship between Celegorm and Aredhel burned to ashes with the Swan-ships at Losgar. He'd not known this at the time. How could he have? Celegorm had thought that Fingolfin would turn back at Araman as Finarfin had done, and that he would take all of his host with him, including his children. He thought that Aredhel would return to Tirion, and she would remain in Aman.

Not once had it occurred to Celegorm that Fingolfin might choose to brave the Grinding Ice. Not once did it occur to him that the Noldor abandoned in Araman would. Celegorm wouldn't have done it, in their place. That was a shameful thing to admit, and never would he admit it aloud, but there it was. If he had been in Fingolfin's shoes, Celegorm would have turned right back around and returned to Tirion. The odds of surviving the Grinding Ice were just too long.

But Fingolfin and his host had not turned back. They had braved the Grinding Ice, and Aredhel had braved it along with their people. They had emerged into Beleriand with the rising of Vása before them, and had become stronger for it, but all the things they suffered to get there… Celegorm learned of it. Elenwë died. Arakáno died. So many of the Noldor of Fingolfin's host died, and those who survived were thin and ragged and haunted by all that they had lost.

Most of it he learned from Aredhel's lips herself. He had gone to see her when they camped still by Lake Mithrim, in the days before Fingon brought Maedhros back from Angband. Aredhel had always been so forgiving that Celegorm, foolishly, wasn't all that worried about the sort of reception he would get from his cousin at this particular reunion. Their deep friendship still existed in his mind, unbroken by the years apart and all that had happened to drive them apart, but Celegorm's mind was the only place where this friendship still existed.

He saw Aredhel, thin and ragged, teaching her niece to shoot by the shores of the lake. When she laid eyes on him, she set her jaw and told Idril to return to their camp. Alone, Celegorm could barely find the words with which to speak.

"_Cousin… How have you fared?"_

"_How do you think?" she retorted shortly, gathering her niece's small bow and arrows and patting Huan's back absently._

Fëanor's host had suffered when first they came to Endóre. There was no denying that. They had been beset by Morgoth's forces, and after Fëanor's death, they had been forced to try and survive in a dark land where many of the plants were unfamiliar to them and they had no idea what was safe to eat. Winter beset them, and many of their number froze or starved before the snows melted in the dark. Celegorm knew that he was quite a bit thinner than he had ever been in Aman.

But whatever their host had suffered, the suffering of Fingolfin's following had been far greater. Celegorm remembered the way Fingolfin and Lalwen had looked when they came to the Fëanorian camp by the shores of Mithrim. Even so long afterwards when Celegorm finally laid eyes on Aredhel and Idril, they both looked far worse than he ever had in Beleriand. The bones in Aredhel's face and arms were entirely too prominent, the memory of suffering written across her skin, the shadow of starvation lurking behind her eyes.

Celegorm had no idea how to make amends, so he never tried very hard. Aredhel looked at him, hurt, disbelieving, looking in judgment upon his warm clothes, the spare flesh across his bones. Looking in judgment upon the fact that he had lost so little in comparison to her, and wanted to behave as though nothing had happened. The burning ships stood between them, and always would. That Celegorm could offer her no explanation for why he'd not tried to stop Fëanor from burning their ill-gotten ships did not help matters. How could he say to her that he had been so frightened of his father that fear kept him rooted to the ground? How could he ever admit that?

The last time Celegorm saw Aredhel was before they had moved away from the lake, towards the east of Beleriand. She was not so cold to him as she had been, but Celegorm could look into her eyes and know that she would likely never fully forgive him, know that he would never again have the sort of closeness with her that he had once enjoyed.

Sometimes, more than anything, Celegorm wished that he had not gone across the sea with his father and brothers. He wished that he had stayed in Araman with his cousins. He would have suffered greatly on the Helcaraxë, he might have even died, but at least their friendship would have lasted. At least when Celegorm took his dying breath, he would have been able to do so with a clean conscience, knowing that he had paid in suffering what the Falmari had paid, knowing that his kin, among them his dearest friend, did not think him traitor to them.

"How would you have liked that?" he asked Huan wearily. "I don't suppose you would have, my friend. You never had any trouble with snow, but we would have been traveling over Ice for months upon months. I suppose you could have helped with the hunting. How would you have liked that?"

Huan looked up at him, a doleful expression in his enormous brown eyes. Silent, as ever. Maybe he was thinking that if Celegorm _had _braved the Grinding Ice with his kin, and Huan had been there with him, he could very well have been butchered to feed the Quendi, or that he would have starved to death himself.

"Huan… When you were a pup, Oromë told me that you would speak three times before you died. Your silence is something of a comfort to me; it at least reassures me that you are not likely to die soon. But, Irissë… If you knew why she came here, what she was going to say to me… If you knew where she has gone, would you tell me?"

Huan didn't answer.

Celegorm sighed heavily, and stared out over the gray-green sea of grass before him. If he ever saw Aredhel again, he would ask her. He would ask her why she had come. Maybe he would even find it in him to ask for her forgiveness, for his abandonment of her and her people so long ago. In that regard, he had let his pride and his fear rule him for far too long.

But he had to find her first, in this empty land. So Celegorm and Huan clambered to their feet, and continued their wanderings, looking for a white speck on the horizon.

* * *

Findaráto—Finrod  
Turukáno—Turgon  
Arakáno—Argon

Laiquendi—'Green-Elves', a division of the Teleri, natives of Ossiriand (singular: Laiquendë) (Quenya)  
Endóre—Middle-Earth (Quenya)  
Cuiviénen—'The waters of awakening', the lake by which the Elves first awoke  
Nís—woman (plural: nissi)  
Calaquendi—Elves of the Light; Elves of Aman, especially those who saw the light of the Two Trees (singular: Calaquendë) (Quenya)  
Falmari—those among the Teleri who completed the journey to Aman; the name is derived from the Quenya falma, '[crested] wave.'  
Vása—the Exilic name for the Sun, signifying 'The Consumer' (Quenya)  
Quendi—Elves (singular: Quendë) (Quenya)


	3. The Trees Loom Before You

"_Listen, don't go into Nan Elmoth."_

_Celegorm frowned at his brother as he turned to go. There was a slight catch in Curufin's voice, and when Celegorm turned to look at him, he saw that he looked unusually anxious. They were standing on the grassy hill just outside of the fortress-town where they made their home, alone, but Celegorm still lowered his voice as he asked, "Why, exactly?"_

_His eyebrows inched ever-closer towards his hairline as Curufin continued to look anxious, and frankly uncomfortable. He gritted his teeth, muttering, "Do you remember our first encounter with the lord of Nan Elmoth?"_

_Celegorm snorted. "Eöl? How could I forget? I thought I was going to have to pull the two of you apart."_

"_Yes, well, after that, I thought it would be prudent to, ah, send scouts into Nan Elmoth."_

"_You _what_?" Celegorm shook his head and stared at him in amazement. "I'm going to assume that the fact that you are still alive with your ears intact to tell me this means that Nelyo never found out."_

_Curufin shook his head vigorously, the anxious look in his eyes bleeding out to be replaced by something rather grim. "They never came back, Tyelkormo."_

"_They never came back?" Celegorm echoed. A cold feeling settled in the pit of his stomach. "What do you mean by that?"_

_His brother lifted his arms from his sides, before letting them fall back to idleness, and shook his head helplessly. Celegorm didn't think he'd ever seen Curufin look so helpless, not since they were freezing by the shores of the lake in Mithrim and Celebrimbor, still a tiny toddler, screamed for his mother in the dark of endless night. "Their horses returned, eventually, skittish, wild-eyed, refusing to be handled by most for weeks afterwards. The riders never returned."_

_In Celegorm's mind, there wasn't a whole lot that could mean, except, "So Eöl killed them, then?"_

"_I'm not sure if it was his doing."_

"_How can you not be sure, Curvo? It seems rather straightforward to me."_

_Curufin squeezed his eyes shut. "Because," he said reluctantly, "because after those horses came back, and their riders didn't, I began asking the locals what they knew of Nan Elmoth. People go missing in there. Often, no, always, since long before Eöl settled there. According to them, he's the only one ever to settle in the dark forest and not go missing. Besides Maitimo's probable reaction if you venture into that forest uninvited, I tell you this: If you go into Nan Elmoth, you will not come back out."_

-0-0-0-

Celegorm wandered ever further south, walking up and down Himlad from east to west and back again, wandering south all the while. He asked the scouts and soldiers garrisoning the outposts if they had seen Aredhel, and none of them could say that they had. If she had passed through this region, she had managed to do so completely undetected, something that gave Celegorm little comfort.

One of the outposts was visited by a rider from the fortress-town while Celegorm was sheltering there during a storm. It was a message from Curufin to Celegorm: none of their brothers knew where Aredhel was. Maedhros was sending letters of his own to Fingolfin, Fingon, and their other cousins, but could give no answer himself as to where their cousin had gone. Celegorm bit down a bitter retort bubbling in his throat when he read the letter. Curufin could not hear him, and it was no fault of his, not really.

No one had seen her. Absolutely no one had seen Aredhel here in Himlad, and there was no one to mark her passing. There was no one who could mark her journey north, east or south; Celegorm only knew that she could not have passed into Doriath, remembering Thingol's policy towards the Noldor not related to him by blood. So there was nothing to be done except for Celegorm to continue his wanderings, even as Huan whimpered at the thunder and the harsh wind threatened to cut him to the bone.

Further south he went, further and further south. The forest of Region, the dense southern forest of Doriath, loomed to the west, and Celegorm paid it no mind. Aredhel would not have gone there, not after being turned away once, and could not have ventured into Doriath, not with Melian's Girdle keeping nearly the entirety of the Noldor from entering. The only thing Aredhel would have found in Doriath was confusion and starvation. Celegorm would not countenance the possibility that that had been her fate.

Celegorm climbed to the top of a steep hill one gray, chilly afternoon, and there was another forest, looming to the south. A forest of tall, dark trees, twisted and tangled together, like a single living thing. Nan Elmoth.

Curufin and Eöl had loathed each other immediately and unconditionally upon meeting, and frankly, Celegorm hadn't liked the looks of his neighbor to the south either, had not liked the fact that this was the sort of person whose lands sat between Himlad and Estolad. Celegorm had not liked the idea of Nan Elmoth acting as a barrier between him and his youngest brothers, all on account of the person who held that sunless forest.

In the nearly three hundred years it had been since Celegorm and his brothers moved east out of Hithlum, Celegorm had only seen Eöl a handful of times. He had, Celegorm gathered, no love of sunlight, and moreover was very skilled at passing through guarded places unseen, a skill that Celegorm hoped he had not passed on to his own scouts, if he had them (Celegorm had never seen any). These encounters, usually the result of Curufin waylaying Eöl on the way to or back from Nogrod or Belegost, were never what anyone could term pleasant.

After that first meeting, Eöl was never overtly hostile towards them again. There was at least a chilly, backhanded politeness maintained between them. But Eöl bore even less love for the Noldor than he did for sunlight; Celegorm could see it in his cold, watchful stare, hear it in his harsh voice. Celegorm had a hard time believing that Eöl would give Aredhel shelter, nor that she would be there now (And given Curufin's story, the idea was not one Celegorm relished).

What was worse was that Celegorm had no idea exactly where in the forest Eöl lived to check, just in case. Nan Elmoth looked small on a map, but that was misdirection. It laid next to the far larger Region, and one could be forgiven for thinking Nan Elmoth small by comparison, the sort of forest that could be ridden through in a few hours, but all one had to was do what Celegorm had done now, and looked upon it from a nearby hill to know better. The dark forest was vast, sitting in the flatland just beyond the Celon. Nan Elmoth's shadow stretched out towards the edge of the horizon.

Celegorm had never ventured into Nan Elmoth. Maedhros had admonished his younger brothers to avoid doing anything that could give Thingol offense, given that the King of Doriath had precious little love for Fëanor's sons to start with and could start trying to make life _very _difficult for all of the Noldor in Beleriand if he saw fit, and had said all of this in the sort of tone that promised that they could expect to get a good ear-boxing if they disobeyed. Eöl was one of Thingol's subjects, and he had to have some level of favor with him for Thingol to have granted him the lease of the entire forest. In that case, violating Nan Elmoth's borders sounded like just the sort of thing that would give Thingol offense, and Celegorm liked his ears just the way they were.

He stood on the crest of the grassy hill, staring out on a gray sky and a dark, tangled forest. Celegorm pulled his cloak closer about him, and started to walk south again.

The river Celon, though fast-flowing, was narrow, not particularly deep, and easily forded. Celegorm came to the stony shores of the river, Huan by his side, and had but a few paces to walk before he was standing at the edge of the forest. He came to a dead halt, and stared into the trees.

It was still, and silent. Himlad was often assailed by fierce winds, but the howling of the wind and its fearsome breath all fell to silence and stillness at the borders of Nan Elmoth. Celegorm saw nothing, no animals, and no people; if Eöl kept scouts to watch the borders of his lands, he had clearly instructed them to remain hidden, and done so to good end. He heard nothing, not the wind, nor the sound of branches being trod upon that might have signaled the presence of Quendi out of Celegorm's line of sight, nor even birdsong. The forest was empty.

There was at the borders of Nan Elmoth a thick fence of gnarled, tangled shrubs in among the trees, their presence as clear a message as any fence made of stone or lumber as Celegorm had ever seen. Beyond that was darkness and shadows, and trees in possession of a disturbing sameness. Celegorm knew that there must not have been undergrowth like this in the heart of the forest; he knew no plants that could grow without sunlight, and he saw none when staring into the depths of Nan Elmoth.

The chill, uncharacteristic even for a Himlad summer, suddenly seemed far sharper and more pervasive than it had before. Celegorm felt the wet chill seeping into his clothes, his skin, his silver hair and his bones. He stared into the darkness, and felt as though something was staring back at him. He felt as though there were countless pairs of eyes staring back at him, not of Quendi, nor of beasts, not of any living creature that Celegorm knew. There were countless pairs of eyes staring back at him, unblinking, watchful, watching him as he stood at the borders of Nan Elmoth, and contemplated crossing over despite his brother's warnings. He felt like he was being pulled in.

And then it occurred to him.

Curufin said that his scouts' horses had returned to the town wild-eyed and panicked. Celebrimbor had said the same thing of Aredhel's horse.

Could she be…?

"Huan?"

A soft whimpering at his side awoke Celegorm's thoughts from half-sleep. He looked and saw the great gray hound backing away, staring nervously into the forest, whimpering as though frightened. _He is frightened._

"Huan?" Celegorm asked, concerned. "What is it?"

Huan turned tail and swam back across the Celon, shaking himself dry on the opposite shore. He stared at Celegorm, and barked once, eyes full of anxiety.

"What's gotten into you? Surely you're not afraid of venturing into the forest like those horses…"

He felt it, then.

Celegorm really felt the pull this time. Before, he'd felt it, even been aware of it, but had written it off as unimportant and not worth worrying over. Now, he felt the pull, felt it trying to draw him in to the forest like a reel drawing a fish up out of the waters of the Celon. He began to back away, slowly, his breath catching in his throat.

Celegorm spared one last glance for the forest of Nan Elmoth. In the gloom of the dark forest, he saw no hint of light. He saw not so much as a speck of white, no sign that Aredhel had been there, or was there now. Even so, as he turned and crossed the Celon once more, he felt as though he was abandoning his cousin to some strange fate, alone in the wilderness (Or closer than he thought).

Thus, Celegorm resumed his search within his own lands, a search that over the next few weeks he became increasingly sure was hopeless. Finally, as summer was waning and the world began to wake to frost in the mornings, he returned to the home he kept with his brother and nephew. Curufin had nothing new to tell him. Celegorm laid down at night, and dreamt of her, wandering alone, lost in the dark.

* * *

Nelyo, Maitimo—Maedhros


End file.
